This chalk message appeared in front of a home in St. Paul's Summit University neighborhood in recent days. City residents have been using chalk to create love-filled sidewalk notes in response to an election they regard as hate-filled. (Pioneer Press: Julio Ojeda-Zapata)

This chalk message appeared in front of a home in St. Paul's Summit University neighborhood in recent days. City residents have been using chalk to create love-filled sidewalk notes in response to an election they regard as hate-filled. (Pioneer Press: Julio Ojeda-Zapata)

This chalk message appeared in front of a home in St. Paul's Summit University neighborhood in recent days. City residents have been using chalk to create love-filled sidewalk notes in response to an election they regard as hate-filled. (Pioneer Press: Julio Ojeda-Zapata)

Sharon Rosenberg-Scholl, who lives on St. Paul’s North End and teaches at a Jewish school, is among those creating love-filled chalk messages on their sidewalks in the wake an election they feel was full of hate. (Courtesy photo: Sharon Rosenberg-Scholl)

Sharon Rosenberg-Scholl, who lives on St. Paul’s North End and teaches at a Jewish school, is among those creating love-filled chalk messages on their sidewalks in the wake an election they feel was full of hate. (Courtesy photo: Sharon Rosenberg-Scholl)

This weekend, Sharon Rosenberg-Scholl took boxes of colored chalk off her back porch, left over from when her 12-year-old son was younger, and wrote “We love immigrants” in front of her house in St. Paul’s North End. She hasn’t heard from the African immigrants who live next door, but the gesture made her feel like she was doing something in the wake of a presidential election that has left her feeling anxious.

Sharon Rosenberg-Scholl, who lives on St. Paul’s North End and teaches at a Jewish school, is among those creating love-filled chalk messages on their sidewalks in the wake an election they feel was full of hate. (Courtesy photo: Sharon Rosenberg-Scholl)

“With all the grief and anger, it seemed like a small and positive thing to do,” said Rosenberg-Scholl, who teaches at a Jewish school. “I’ve been wondering a lot about how all my neighbors are feeling and I wanted to make sure there is some love and positivity out there.”

Similar chalk messages have popped up around the Twin Cities, and photos of hundreds of them have been posted with the hashtag #NeighborhoodLoveNotes on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. The movement even has its own Facebook page.

The idea came from the Rev. Ashley Horan, a Unitarian Universalist clergywoman from Minneapolis and executive director of the Minnesota Unitarian Universalist Social Justice Alliance.

“The day after the election I was feeling very upset,” Horan said Monday. “I knew how afraid and hurting everybody was in my community, which is full of queer folks and black and brown folks and immigrants. I needed to do something.”

She believes Donald Trump’s win has “emboldened and empowered” people to speak negatively about Muslims and immigrants, make racist slurs, and put down women and members of the LGBTQ community. So on her sidewalk she wrote things like “Black lives will always matter” and “Ninguna persona es ilegal” (“No one is illegal”).

Her idea was picked up by a number of Unitarian Universalist churches locally and in other parts of the country, some of which handed out colored chalk at worship services. A Facebook page about the effort has been shared nearly 20,000 times.

This chalk message was one of dozens that appeared Sunday in St. Paul’s Lowertown, in reaction to the recent presidential election. (Courtesy of Stacey Lehmann)

The messages have gotten less specific and more broad as they’ve spread across the country. Someone from Elgin, Ill., posted the chalk message “If love hasn’t won, then it’s not the end.” A Grand Rapids, Mich., poster posed seven preschoolers sitting next to “You are ALL loved” written on a driveway.

Fritz and Barbie Steimann of Roseville posted a photo of their chalk message, “Imagine” next to a heart, on the driveway of their Roseville home.

And someone spread messages of love all over Lowertown in downtown St. Paul: “You are welcome here #Lowertown cares” and “love lives here” and “Lowertown has your back” and “this community needs you” and “we should hang out more often.”

Stacey Lehmann is a gay man in his 40s who has lived in Lowertown for 12 years, a place he calls “a melting pot of diverse people.” He said he has no clue who wrote the messages. But he wanted to say thanks.

“To be honest, I have felt a little unsafe,” he said, about the days since the election. “And it may be just in my head. But I have. So it felt so good to see those love messages. ‘You’re safe in lowertown.’ I even started to tear up a little bit. It just makes you feel good.”

Maja Beckstrom covered nonprofits, religion, poverty and welfare reform and wrote family lifestyle features and the Family Outings column during her time at the Pioneer Press.

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